Generally, in optoelectronics and, particularly, in optoelectronic integrated circuits, an optical waveguide captures an optical signal from a light source and transmits the optical signal to a photodetector (also referred to herein as a photosensor or optical receiver), which converts the optical signal to an electrical signal. Typically, the optical waveguide of such an optoelectronic structure will be made of a different semiconductor material than the light source and photodetector. For example, silicon is often used as the core material for the optical waveguide because silicon is transparent to optical signals in the infrared wavelength bands and germanium, silicon germanium or III-V compound semiconductor materials are often used for the light source and photodetector because these materials absorb optical signals in those same infrared wavelength bands. When different semiconductor materials are incorporated into the same optoelectronic structure, the structure is referred to in the art as a hybrid optoelectronic structure. Current techniques for forming such hybrid optoelectronic structures provide for forming an optical waveguide such that it has a first end adjacent to the light source and a second end, which is opposite the first end, adjacent to the photodetector. Since, in the hybrid optoelectronic structure, the light source and photodetector are formed with different semiconductor materials than the optical waveguide, they are also usually formed at a different level on the chip than the optical waveguide (e.g., above or below the ends of the optical waveguide). Forming the light source and photodetector on a different level of the chip than the optical waveguide limits size scaling of the optoelectronic structure.